tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post115810123014974797..comments2018-02-21T13:37:56.078-05:00Comments on Boston 1775: Samuel Adams: voice of moderationJ. L. Bellnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-1161795146710138582006-10-25T11:52:00.000-05:002006-10-25T11:52:00.000-05:00Google Book also offers the chance to search or do...Google Book also offers the chance to search or download PDFs of the four volumes of the <I>Writings of Samuel Adams</I>. Since they were published in 1908, these books are in the public domain. <BR/><BR/>Pauline Maier's <I>The Old Revolutionaries</I> is an interesting set of profiles of the older generation of politicians, many of whom didn't end up in the federal government after 1789 because they were either dead, too old, or distrustful of the new structure. <BR/><BR/>There's also been more respect from scholars in recent years for anti-Federalists, whose ranks included Adams, Mason, and Lee. <BR/><BR/>But the bulk of the popular attention still goes, as you say, to the men who were involved in two or more of these three efforts: the Revolution, the creation of the federal government, and the running of the federal government in its first decades. <BR/><BR/>To work on one enterprise but on neither of the others seems to leave a "founder" in the second rank, however important he was to that one enterprise. <BR/><BR/>As for "Why would someone publish Fisher Ames' works over those of S. Adams or R. H. Lee?" I think it's important to note that the editor of the two-volumes <I>Works of Fisher Ames</I> had the last name of Ames.J. L. Bellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15405157000473731801noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-1161794039844765122006-10-25T11:33:00.000-05:002006-10-25T11:33:00.000-05:00Fascinating blogs on Samuel Adams and his reputati...Fascinating blogs on Samuel Adams and his reputation as a scoundrel.<BR/><BR/>I have read S. Adams' writings by Henry Alonzo Cushing, as well as a large sample of writings from about 70 other founders. I think it is quite interesting that the last generation of historians have focused heavily on publishing thought from Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton, Franklin and Washington, and ignored just about everyone else -- and have ignored just about everyone else, including Sam Adams, John Dickinson, Richard Henry Lee, Roger Sherman, George Mason, James Wilson, Charles Carroll, and numerous others whose writings were available a century ago, but are becoming increasingly harder to find. Why would someone publish Fisher Ames' works over those of S. Adams or R. H. Lee?<BR/><BR/>In "Spur of Fame," John Adams and Benjamin Rush have an insightful discussion of this very issue; Washington, Hamilton and Ames were canonized while S. Adams, Hancock and Otis were entirely ignored.<BR/><BR/>In reality it goes much further than that. The first generation of founders -- S. Adams, Dickinson and R. H. Lee -- are labeled as "radicals" because they were anti-establishment protestors. Hamilton, Madison and even Jefferson -- despite the occasional watering-the-tree-of-liberty-with-the-blood-of-tyrants-rhetoric -- were establishment figures, who promoted the Constitution and establishment of a strong national government. Even where the rhetoric favors libertarianism, the reality is that Jefferson ignored those principles to buy Louisiana or promote science and education. <BR/><BR/>Hence, the rhetoric of the Revolution has been distilled to "no taxation without representation" because it fits in nicely with the "taxed enough already" conservative viewpoint of the gentile historians of the 19th century or the political commentators of 20th/21st. The notion that the Revolution was *really* motivated by the repression of protest, in particularly the elimination of jury trials and other legal rights, so often discussed by S. Adams, is ignored because it doesn't fit in with a view of "victims rights" as opposed to "criminal rights".<BR/><BR/>Ergo, the old protestors, become the sacrificial radicals that no one wants to really talk about, except to the extent that it supports the establishment interpretation of the Revolution, Constitution, and Federal periods, that is, no taxation, limited government, and so forth.<BR/><BR/>BTW, for those that are interested, plain text versions of vol. 2, 3, and 4 of Samuel Adams writings are available here:<BR/><BR/>http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2092<BR/>http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2093<BR/>http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/2094Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com